Social issues such as those you mention are at the heart of the upgrades of working class to middle class of the post WW II period.
Soon those issues will be unwinding. But that is another posting.
The relation: Working-politicians had a no non-sense character.
The western working class knew its place and accepted. That had some danger - for the power elites- lurking. Working class, as its name implied, had a hero in the Communism that gained ground in Eastern Europe.
(Klaser may recognize the same danger lurking during the 90s that forced Brazil into creating a new middle class via upgrade of the masses of poor people.) The politicians and the oligarchies were afraid the working class would turn to Communism. Or worse! They could embrace the strong men riding a wave of populism.
There must be a third way: The solution was to upgrade the working to middle class.
In its new stratum, (see Great Society that "addressed education, medical care, urban problems, and transportation") they bought houses cars and educated their children, the new middle class had a higher degree of freedom.
Now they were allied to the establishment. Important now is that upgraded middle class starting embracing a new set of values.
Their causes were different. Gone were the memories of Great Depression. Slowly a new society was being created. It was called a Cultural Revolution. The 60's, the liberal causes and Civil Liberties). Only me was seeing "Silent Spring" as the embryo of the nefarious environmentalism turned into exacerbated Greenism.
The new middle class had freedom but did not know what to do it. They started smoking pot thinking they were exercising that freedom. The men and women who had fought and died for people to enjoy freedom must have been turning into their graves, a fact recognized in the book "The Closing of the American Mind"
As you correctly put the politician sold the Causes, values of the working class now upgraded to Middle class and all the rest of it.
(2) i automatically suspect all political leaders with resume featuring any and (god forbid) all of prep schools / elite high schools, city-based ivy league schools, legal / finance / consulting professions, goldman sachs / mckinsey, trophy wife / husband / pets / causes, organized and invasive religion, military service, and obvious inabilities to relate, hold discourse, compromise, be logical and systematic, choose associates, and keep promises.
And you also correctly put it is going to be changed via a mechanism that I call The Great Unwinding. |
